LETTER TO V. M. MOLOTOV ABOUT THE WORK OF THE STATISTICAL, AND REGISTRATION AND DISTRIBUTION DEPARTMENTS OF THE R.C.P.(B.) C.C.

Published:First published in 1959 inLenin Miscellany XXXVI.

      Printed from the original.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Progress Publishers,1976,

      Moscow,Volume 45,

      pages467b-468a.Translated:Yuri SdobnikovTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet ArchiveYou may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

ComradeMolotov:

Havingfilled in the questionnaire or the form of the
last census of R.C.P.
members,[1]I have come to the
firm conclusion that the business of statistics at the C.C.
(and probably, the whole of the registration and
distribution) is very poorly organised.

Eitherwe have a fool in charge of statistics, or there
are fools and pedants sitting in important posts somewhere
in these “departments” (if the said institutions under the
C.C. are so called), and you have apparently no time to
look into what they are doing.

1.Thehead of the Statistical Department should be fired.

2.Thisand the Registration and Distribution
departments must be given athoroughshake-up.

Otherwise,we ourselves (“combating red tape”...) breed the
most disgraceful and stupid red tape under our very noses.

TheC.C. has vast powers. Its possibilities are gigantic.
We are distributing 200,000–400,000 Party workers, and
through them thousands upon thousands of non-Party men.

Andthis gigantic communist undertaking is being dead
ruined by stupid red tape!

Allthe censuses must be finished in a month.

Theirprocessing should be reduced to a minimum, so as
also to complete it within a month.

Afterthat nine-tenths of the Statistical and an equal
proportion of the Registration and Distribution departmentsof the C.C. should be disbanded, and their organisation
started anew.

Youyourselfshouldget ridof minor problems (shift
them on to your assistants and assistants’ assistants) to
concentrate entirely on the business of being apolitical
secretaryandsuperintendent directingthe work of
organisation, registration, etc.

Hasthere been a census of “responsible workers”? The
result likewise appears to be a zero; it is worse, probably
being a minus.

Writeor phone me, and we shall talk it over in greater
detail.

Weneed cards for severalhundred(for a start) leading
Party workers, classifying them as propagandists,
administrators, agitators, teachers, etc., and containingreferencesabout their work (say, a record of the last five posts)
given bysuch-and-such(4–6) persons. We have been chasing
after thousands and hundreds of thousands, trifling our time
away bureaucratically,without learningto place these men.

Withcommunist greetings,Lenin

[1]Areference to the All-Russia census of the R.C.P.(B.) members
in early 1922, for the purpose of establishing the membership
composition and making an exact count of Party members. In
Moscow it was held from February 6, 1922. For the questionnaire
filled in by Lenin see present edition, Vol. 42, pp. 457–61.

Thecensus of responsible workers mentioned in the letter was
carried out in July 1921 to determine the number and
qualifications of the governing section of the Party in gubernia and uyezd
centres, their territorial distribution and efficiency of use.